Lord Rees is the UK's Astronomer Royal. He is based at Cambridge University where he is a Fellow (and Former Master) of Trinity College. He is a member of the House of Lords, and a former President of the Royal Society. His research interests include space exploration, black holes, galaxy formation, the multiverse and prospects for extraterrestrial life. He is co-founder of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risks at Cambridge University (CSER).

Christopher Geidt is a Member of the House of Lords, a Privy Counsellor and a Permanent Lord in Waiting to The Queen.

After a career predominantly in public service, Christopher currently holds appointments including Chairman for International Relations and Corporate Responsibility at Schroders plc, Chairman of King’s College London and Chairman of The Queen’s Commonwealth Trust. An earlier career in the armed forces and diplomatic service - including postings in Sarajevo, Geneva and Brussels - was followed by fifteen years in the Royal Household, where he served for a decade as The Queen’s Private Secretary.

Christopher studied International Relations at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and at Magdalen College, Oxford, of which he is an Honorary Fellow. He first graduated in War Studies from King’s College London, of which he is a Fellow. Christopher is also an Honorary Bencher of Middle Temple and a former Fisher Family Fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

Michael Hastings is KPMG International’s Global Head of Corporate Citizenship, a Vice President of UNICEF, a Trustee of the Vodafone Group Foundation and President of development aid agency ZANE. He was previously the BBC’s Head of Public Affairs and also a non-executive Director of British Telecom.

Michael has served on several World Economic Forum’s Global Councils including the Next Generation and the Role of Business. He served on the Commission for Racial Equality for nine years and sits on the Council of the Overseas Development Institute in the UK. He was a leading advisor to a recent Chatham House enquiry into the Future Role of the UK in Foreign Affairs.

In 2002 Michael was awarded a CBE in recognition of his services to crime reduction, including 15 years as Chairman of Crime Concern. He was awarded a peerage in 2005 and in the same year received the UNICEF award for his ‘outstanding contribution to understanding and effecting solutions for Africa’s children’.

James Bacchus is an American lawyer, businessman, and politician who served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida from 1991 to 1995. He is a CIGI senior fellow, as well as the Distinguished University Professor of Global Affairs and director of the Center for Global Economic and Environmental Opportunity at the University of Central Florida. He was a founding judge, twice chairman and chief judge of the Appellate Body at the World Trade Organization in Geneva. As well as sitting in the US Congress, he served as a trade negotiator for the United States. James is a senior counsellor to the International Center for Trade and Sustainable Development in Switzerland, and a senior fellow of the Cato Institute in Washington, DC. He served on the high-level advisory panel to the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, chaired the Global Commission on Trade and Investment Policy of the International Chamber of Commerce, and chaired the Global Sustainability Council of the World Economic Forum. For more than 14 years, he chaired the global practice of a law firm that is the largest in the United States and one of the largest in the world.

Andrew Hind was the first Chief Executive of the Charity Commission from 2004 until September 2010, during which time he helped to transform the regulatory framework for charities in the UK and internationally. He is Editor of Charity Finance magazine and Visiting Professor of Charity Governance and Finance at Cass Business School, City University, London.

Andrew is a Trustee of The Baring Foundation and serves on a number of boards including the Professional Standards Authority for Health and Social Care, the NCVO Advisory Council and is a Non-Executive Director at the Office of the Information Commissioner.

The author of The Governance and Management of Charities, Andrew has extensive experience of working with the NGO sector. Formerly a senior executive with ActionAid and Barnardo’s, and chief operating officer of BBC World Service, he received the Outstanding Achievement Award for longstanding commitment and service to the voluntary sector at the UK Charity Awards in 2008.

Garton Kamchedzera is Associate Professor of Law and former Dean of Law at Chancellor College, University of Malawi and a legal practitioner. With a doctorate on the rights of the child from the University of Cambridge and a Masters in human rights from the University of Warwick, he has worked for UNICEF and served as an advisor to many international and bilateral organisations and development agencies. He has been instrumental in promoting the adoption of a rights-based approach to development and the application of certain aspects of the private law of trusts to public law, which is of particular relevance to decision-making on the part of those with fiduciary duties.

Rowena is a founder and Chair of Women on Boards UK, supporting women to leverage their professional skills and experience into non-executive director and other board level roles. She is also a Non-Executive Director of the Digital Catapult and has recently served as a City Fellow of Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge.

Rowena spent 25 years in the ICT industry, writing software in Australia; building and selling an IT services business in London and finally running several multi-national software and hosting businesses.

Since completing the Sloan Masters at London Business School in 2002, Rowena has focused on board and advisory roles. Her governance experience includes six years in the not-for-profit sector and Chair and five years as Non-Executive Director in the services sector. Rowena also brings broad strategic expertise and global operations experience in the digital sector, along with a passion for entrepreneurship and innovation and experience as an angel investor and in microfinance in Africa.

Myles Wickstead is an expert on international development and Africa. In 2004/2005, he was Head of Secretariat to the Commission for Africa. From 2000-2004 he was British Ambassador to Ethiopia and Djibouti, and before that he represented the UK on the Board of the World Bank. He coordinated the 1997 Government White Paper 'Eliminating World Poverty: A Challenge for the 21st Century', and from 1993 to 1997 he was the Head of the British Development Division in Eastern Africa.

Myles is now Visiting Professor (International Relations) at the Open University and holds a number of Board and Senior Advisory positions in the international development and foreign affairs sectors. He chairs the Board of One World Media, and is on the Boards of the Baring Foundation and International Inspiration, and the Advisory Council of Wilton Park.

John Wood is the Secretary General of the Association of Commonwealth Universities. He has doctorates from Cambridge and Sheffield Universities and has held academic posts at several leading universities including Nottingham (Dean of Engineering), The Open University, and Imperial College London (Principal of the Faculty of Engineering, Senior International Adviser), where he is currently visiting professor and is an honorary professor of nanotechnology at UCL. He was chief executive of the Research Council responsible for large and international science facilities.

He is chair of Research Information Network, INASP and was formerly on the advisory board of the British Library and on the board of the Joint Information Services Committee. A founding member of the European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures, he became chair in 2004. He became the first chair of the European Research Area Board in 2008, responsible for high-level advice to the European Commission. He subsequently became chair of the European Research Area Board and represents Europe on the Global Research Data Alliance as co-chair.

John was elected as a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 1999 and was made a Commander of the British Empire in 2007 for ‘services to science’. He was made an officer of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for bringing the international negotiations for the European X-ray Free Electron Laser to fruition.